History repeats itself... and casts a long shadow.

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is the sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. The ‘Zelda’ games tend to be among the best titles on that generation’s Nintendo console, but Breath of the Wild, which launched on the Nintendo Wii U and the Nintendo Switch in 2017 as a bridging title - launching the Switch -  stunned players. Being one of the best games to date on the Wii U made sense - it was one of their final launches, but to be one of the best games on both consoles?  Still? To this day? Seven years later! We remain shocked, confused, dazed and amazed. IGN rates it the best video game of all time, and they aren’t alone. GamesRadar puts it at no.3; EMPIRE puts it at no.2, so the list continues. 

Many cite Breath of the Wild as the most ambitious change to the Zelda game series since 1998’s Ocarina of Time. Perhaps it’s an apt comparison. Both the subsequent sequels to these pivotal entries have not entirely escaped their predecessor's shadow, yet both are great games in their own right. Despite this “terrible fate”, Majora’s Mask reached cult status and had a 3DS remake, and Tears of the Kingdom is the most commercially successful Zelda game to date - so… let’s break it down.

The Wonders Within

Link’s nemesis, Ganondorf, is back!  He’s back and on the warpath. Link’s arch-nemesis has never looked more menacing, monstrous or intentional than he does in this game. The Gerudo King’s return is welcome, compared to the nebulous presence of “Calamity Ganon” in BotW. Nintendo has learned its lesson; the narrative around Ganondorf is vengeful, dark and aggressive. The Demon King soon finds ways to live up to his legacy, but even early on is established as an evil leader with unlimited ambition; worse yet, he commands a far stronger army than we saw in BotW. Sometimes (at least spiritually, as we know he isn't quite, canonically), it feels like he is the same evil from Ocarina of Time - and that is no bad thing at all!

Hyrule has moved on since BotW. A rebuilding effort is taking place throughout Hyrule, and Zelda is now seen as a unifying leader. Not only is the world you might remember from BotW more fleshed out. The hills and mountains have cave systems (and treasures!) within them to explore; the lands have evolved, and the world has moved on. There are new towns to discover, familiar villages dealing with new troubles, and because the graphics engine is more robust - the weather and the environments are still as striking as ever. Monsters come in teams, so the denizens of Hyrule are also hunting them alongside you.

Hyrule is also three times larger. The Sky Islands are a network of floating isles left behind by a long-forgotten battle and a hidden, ancient civilisation. Under Hyrule awaits an entire world of darkness and shadow! The Depths are reminiscent of Stranger Thing’s ‘Upside Down’ - or Dungeon & Dragon’s ‘Underdark’, and are additionally full of references to Hyrule’s equivalents from previous games (A Link to the Past’s “Dark World” or A Link Between Worlds “Lorule”, Ocarina of Time’s “Sacred Realm”) is the same size of the surface world, and full of danger and adventure. The sheer size of this map is enormously daunting for a busy gamer - but it’s a pleasure to explore.

The Storytelling has been upgraded - along with the Dungeons.

Instead of the ‘sameness’ some complained about in the main dungeons of BotW (which arguably were very similar in tone to the 120 smaller shrines), we now have five unique dungeons. Around each of them, you will find extraordinary narrative build-up and story experiences reminiscent of Ocarina of Time or Twilight Princess. The Dungeons still don’t quite pose the same difficulty as those more linear games, but the dungeon bosses are unique and fun fights. In some places, the set pieces are more potent for those with BotW memories due to previous time spent in those locations. There are also 152 new shrines, which remain vital to Link’s strength and skill progression. They are more inventive than before and seem to have more ways to solve them than BotW offered.

Tears of the Kingdom is a creative playground.

From fusing new weapons and arrows to building vehicles, TotK offers several new creative mechanics. That’s on top of the existing BotW mechanics, such as Cooking food and mixing potions, collecting and dyeing armour sets, and just spending forever finding new ways to kill monsters. This game has amped the creativity up from 11 to 11,000. So when you are knackered and want to bash some heads together, you can. However, vehicle building may not be for everyone.

Quality of life upgrades - from the UI to helpful items.

It’s now possible to carry a portable cooking pot; there is a (not entirely practical) recipe book, and the UI is better in TotK than in BotW. The game also learned some tricks from the spinoff game The Legend of Zelda: Age of Calamity and has included a little more artwork connected to character descriptions. The improved menus make the game, in most cases, more intuitive to play. Additionally, the graphics are suped up; whereas BotW had to work on the Wii U so had limited scope for graphical processing, TotK has free reign to max out the Switch’s graphics.

The Real "Tears" in this Kingdom

The world might just be too big. Not to be that person. However. Here's the thing. Hyrule is huge this time. Three whole maps the size of Breath of the Wild’s Hyrule require a lot of additional content to bring them to life. Real life is diverse - Hyrule often isn’t. Unfortunately, this is particularly true of the newer maps, the Depths and the Skies. You may find a rogue traveller - or a clutch of monsters on Hyrule’s surface - and to Nintendo’s credit, they are more dynamic than they were in BotW. But it’s not enough, especially in the Skies, which feel barren. There isn’t enough attention given to the variety of the world’s inhabitants for enemies and allies. The Depths often get criticised for feeling repetitive - and it’s mainly the same issue: there isn’t enough variety down there- which is a tragedy because the first time down there is indeed a nightmarish thrill. Perhaps the sheer size of the maps had me ruling out even attempting a complete 100% playthrough from the start. Somehow, even with DLC, BotW felt manageable.

The game wants to forget you played Breath of the Wild.

I won’t say what, but there is an excellent moment early on when (if you have a BotW save game on your Switch), TotK gives you an emotional little moment and pulls in data from the your BotW save file. How wonderful it would have been if TotK picked up where your BotW game left off and pulled in all your weapons, achievements, hearts, and stamina bars - maybe even the uncollected DLC chests and their locations -  into the new game. It does not do any of this. The moment that does happen is a nice touch, but it is proof they could have done more to recognise players who sank hundreds of hours into their last game. 

Even TotK’s narrative goes out of its way to provide a jarred and broken continuity from BotW - as if to say, “We aren’t in the same story”. Where BotW had a deep purple goo known as Malice, TotK has instead a deep red goo named Gloom. Not to be mistaken for the same thing despite looking functionally identical. I often wonder if these continuity errors are just poor localisation or if Nintendo teams are so siloed from each other that we as players suffer. Stable owners and shopkeepers who should, narratively speaking, be big fans of Link (the hero who saved the Hyrule in BotW) instead act like he’s a typical traveller. The few who recognise him don’t mention the events around Calamity Ganon, the Sheikah Towers, the Divine Beasts or the Guardians from BotW, which is like living through a war and then the world developing collective amnesia about it. This leads me to.. 

Where are the Guardians - or any Sheikah tech for that matter?!

In the events of BotW - which the game canonically presents as the prelude to TotK - a lot happens that affects the world of Hyrule, including the ultimate defeat of Calamity Ganon. During this, robotic tentacled sentinels known as Guardians patrol the land in Ganon’s name - and terrorise Link (the player), and the people of Hyrule. Yet somehow, the entire Hylian populace acts like that torment never happened! All 120+ of the original BotW Shrines are mysteriously gone, too. There was even a field of broken, defeated Guardians from battles long before the events of BotW near Hateno that is now totally missing. Also missing are the Sheikah towers. The new Skyview towers appear to be modified versions of the same technology, but it’s never explicitly discussed. Additionally, all the Sheikah weapons seem to be gone, and even the Sheikah Slate has been upgraded and renamed the Purah Pad. Even more confusing is that the Sheikah scientists Purah and Robbie are in the game, fairly prominently, as is Sheikah Elder Impa. A giant, gaping, confusing plot hole. Not to mention the emergence of 152+ new shrines, that no one says "it's like when all those other weird shrines appeared". Continuity, plot holes, and most of all - a whole ancient race and their societal legacy apparently, have been sidestepped.

The vehicle building is almost entirely ‘extra.’

A big part of the game’s innovation is the fuse ability which when building weapons, creates a wonderful range of weaponry to unlock and discover. The vehicle-building element is designed to create new solutions to old problems and the grump in me knows that a lot of development time got eaten up by all the physics connected to this part of the game, when maybe we could have had more actual story or dungeons. The main issue with the vehicles beyond offering a slightly underpowered sandbox in a Zelda title, is that they really have very little to do with the narrative. That said, flying around Hyrule is fun.

Everything Good isn’t Great.

In a world as vast as this, we should expect nothing less than immersive world-building. 

While the environment is nothing short of epic, the experiences leave us feeling like we could have seen so much more. Introducing new elemental fruits and combat-useful plants was a great addition but fell short of including all of the traditional fantasy status-condition tropes. The dungeons were far more individual and creative than Breath of the Wild, but they felt short-lived, despite their engaging storytelling. Even the menu UI improvements felt like they did 90% of the job - with some being brilliantly intuitive, and others being poorly implemented (looking at you, cookbook interface!). 

Something is missing, despite that-  there’s no DLC.

Unlike Breath of the Wild, TotK will enjoy no extra downloadable content. Where BotW had an Expansion Pass, with two major DLC releases wrapping in a harder “Master” Mode, Master Sword Trials challenge, extra items, weapons and armour sets and a story expansion….ToTk gets none.

The lack of DLC is particularly rough because some elements feel missing or unfinished in TotK. A DLC dedicated to the Sheikah lore and their relation to the Zonai would go a long way, or explaining the absence of fan favourite Kass the Rito Bard. 

Final Thoughts

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is amazing in every way. While Breath of the Wild made significant changes to the traditional formula of The Legend of Zelda series, Tears of the Kingdom shows humility and integrity by implementing many of those critical lessons and allowing players to experience Hyrule from new vantages and a deeper perspective. There are new missteps this time around, and some flaws that may affect the game's longevity...and sure, it's possible that you might not play it as long as you did Breath of the Wild. Despite it's issues, this game is too hard to deny: an incredible achievement, Tears of the Kingdom represents an iconic entry - which is a lot of fun to play for new and old Zelda fans alike.